New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft says Tim Tebow was signed to the team partly because he's openly religious, the NY Post reports:
“He's a winner, and the fact that spirituality is so important to him is very appealing to me.”
Kraft also labeled Tebow's openly religious nature as “an added dimension” that helped convince the Patriots to sign him to a two-year deal (with no guaranteed money) after five weeks on the NFL unemployment line.
Kraft even echoed the infamous comment by Jets owner Woody Johnson last summer that “you can never have enough Tebow” — a comment Johnson came to regret after the Jets barely used Tebow during the regular season and then released him in April.
“You can't have enough good people around you, and [Tebow] has the added dimension of spirituality being so important to him, and that personally appeals to me a lot,” Kraft said.
Tebow's spirituality has extended, as you recall, to advocacy for the anti-gay, anti-choice evangelical group Focus on the Family. He appeared in a Super Bowl ad for the far-right ministry in 2010.